Budapest!

Thanksgiving in Budapest

2009-11-28T14:51:00.000-08:00

So its been a really long time since I last posted here. I'm sorry for the delay, I have been really with school lately. The Thanksgiving weekend has given me a little extra time to update this blog.

Thanksgiving is not a holiday in Hungary. Thus there was nothing special that happened within the city. Fortunately I am in an American-style school, so we had a holiday this Thursday. Although Hungarians do not celebrate Thanksgiving I was still able to have a good Thanksgiving Turkey dinner on Friday. I was able to meet up with the Calvin students studying in Budapest with the Calvin program. They prepared an excellent Thanksgiving meal. We were still able to eat all the traditional Thanksgiving foods from the turkey and stuffing to some pumpkin pie for desert. I may not have had the privilege to be home with my family this Thanksgiving, but I still did get a great meal and a great group of people to eat dinner with. It certainly made this Thanksgiving a memorable day.

It was with shock that I realize I have less than three weeks left in Budapest. I keep asking myself, "where did the time go?" and "how is it I've been here 3 and a half months already?"

It is with very mixed feelings that I see my time in Budapest coming to a close. Budapest is very different from Grand Rapids is so many ways. There are many things from home that I miss greatly and there are many things here that I have become very attached to and will make it very hard to leave this city.

I'll begin with some of the things I miss. I miss my family back home. Especially my 10 year old sister. Email has enabled me to keep in pretty close contact with my parents during my time here, but I have had very little communication with my sister. It will be nice to return home so that I can spend some quality time with her.
I miss Sherman Street Christian Reformed Church. When I left I knew this would be one of the hardest things to go without for four months. I've found a couple churches here that I really enjoy (and are all in English), but they just aren't the same. At Sherman Street I really feel like I can call the church my own. Many people there know me quite well and I really feel like part of the community. Also I haven't found preaching that I enjoy nearly as much as Pastor David Kromminga's sermons at Sherman Street. I have been able listen to his sermons on the internet, which has been very enjoyable. Even so, it just hasn't been the same.
I miss my friends back home. I have some wonderful friends at Calvin whom I haven't had the opportunity to see or talk to in a very long time. Every time I get an email or some contact from them I am reminded of what wonderful friends I have. I am very much looking forward to seeing everyone again.
I miss knowing how everything works. Shopping for food, buying train tickets, eating in restaurants, attending concerts, sending mail, riding public transportation and many more things are just done differently in Hungary. Although Budapest is a very international city always hosting thousands of visitors from all cultures of the globe, I have lived here long enough when to know when I am not doing something the right way. Because Budapest is such an international city the people here are very tolerant of my failure to know how to function correctly in everyday life. Even so, it isn't a pleasant feeling to know I'm doing something the wrong way. Especially I've lived here three months and I still realize that I haven't figured out the very basics yet.

There is much more I could write about here, but that will have to wait until another day.
Hope all is well with everyone. And once again I am very sorry I was unable to keep this adequately updated this last month.

A trip to Eger.... and the rest of Northeast Hungary

2009-10-28T12:25:00.000-07:00

This last Saturday a fellow BSM student Chris and I decided we wanted to take a day trip to the town of Eger. Eger is well known for its wine cellars and its cathedral, so it is a fairly popular tourist destination in Hungary, so we thought it'd be worth a visit.
So we decided to meet at train station at 9 that morning to catch a 9:33 train. We bought tickets at 9:30 and spent the next three minutes running around the station to find the train. We finally returned to the main entrance and looked at the main board listing all the departures. From there we were able to locate which train to catch. As soon as got to the platform the train began moving and we could not get on. Fortunately there was another train leaving at 10:03 which we were able to catch.

We had to transfer trains at Füzesabony, so we were constantly looking out for the station. By 12:30 we made it to a city called Miskolc where the train stopped for about 10 minutes. We continued looking for the Füzesabony station, but it didn't come. Finally a little after 2 pm the train reached the end of the line at Sátoraljaújhely. At the station we found a map of the Hungarian train system, and realized that we had missed our stop by over 2 and a half hours. We also discovered we were in a small town located pretty much on the Slovakian border. There were only a few trains per a day that left the town, so we ended up having to wait until 7:47 pm until we left.

So we had an entire afternoon to spend in Sátoraljaújhely. We found a really good and cheap restaurant to eat some lunch. Then we walked around the town a bit. There was a big hill right next to the town, so we decided we would try to walk up the hill. We were able to climb to the top of the hill, but most of the climb was simply through dense forests. It was a very beautiful climb, and we had many pretty views of the countryside. When we reached the top, we discovered a chairlift. Apparently there was a chairlift that people could ride up to the top of this hill. This was an interesting discovery. Unfortunately we were not allowed to ride it town. We made it down and back into the station in time for the 7:47 train. We decided that we would ride the train to Füzesabony, and then take a train to Eger from there. It turned out that the train ended at Miskolc, and we had to find another train to get to Füzesabony. We eventually found a train that began at Miskolc and ended at Füzesabony. When we were at Füzesabony, we noticed that the sign for the station was missing two letters. This probably explains why we missed the stop in the morning.
Then at Füzesabony, we were able to find a train that left Füzesabony and ended at Eger. Since we had to ride three different trains their entire length of the line to get from Sátoraljaújhely to Eger took about 4 hours. So we arrived in Eger close to midnight and we didn't have a hostel to stay. We walked all around town looking for a hostel, but did not find any. Just outside of town we found some bushes by the side of the, and a field. We decided that we were going to sleep in the field. This appeared to be our only option. So we ended up sleeping in a field that night. What began as a crazy day ended up even crazier.

We did not get much sleep that night, though daylight savings did help us get an early start to the day. We woke up, went back into town and saw the castle. Then we got some breakfast and went to go see the cathedral. We ended up going to mass in the cathedral in order to see it. Attending mass was a very awkward experience and I had no idea what was going on. I really hope I wasn't too disrespectful there. The fact that the mass was Hungarian didn't help my confusion.

Then after mass we headed to what is known as the Valley of Beautiful Women. This is where the famous wine cellars of Eger are located. We went to a few cellars and tasted many different types of wine. These wines were certainly much better than any other wine I had tasted. I can certainly see why Eger is well-known for its wine. After that we took the train back to Budapest, and finally successfully figured out the Hungarian train system.

Overall it was quite a trip. Not exactly what we wanted, but it sure is a great story to tell. And we did actually get to Eger, even if it took 12 hours longer to get there!

Its been a while....

2009-10-16T06:38:00.001-07:00

So I have been pretty busy lately, and haven't done a good job of keeping my blog up to date. I'm sorry about that.

Anyways the last two weeks have not been too eventful for me. Some of the highlights include having dinner with Calvin students a couple of times and running a 5.2k road race in Budapest.
Last week Saturday I took the GRE. There was a center over here in the city where I was able to take it. That wasn't too fun of an experience, but I'm glad its done and out of the way now. Now I can focus more on my school work and enjoying life abroad.
Last Saturday after the GRE I took a trip just outside the Budapest city limits to Statue Park. This was a very interesting experience. The park contained statues that were put up during communist rule in many different places throughout the city. Since Hungarians really hate their communists they took them down. It was interesting to see this tourist attraction over in the outskirts of the city. It didn't appear to be a very well maintained place, which I found to be pretty interesting. It seems that the Hungarians really hate their communism.

A couple days ago I realized that I have been in Budapest for over 2 months already! That is a really scary thought. It certainly does not feel like its been nearly this long. I can't say I yet really feel comfortable doing business here and living here. I really don't think I could see myself living in Hungary. The language barrier has been quite a problem, and although it has been getting better all the time, this just isn't a lifestyle for me. At the same time, I really like Budapest quite a lot, and I will be sad to go. I feel like I have been blessed greatly to have this opportunity to live in Budapest and participate in Hungarian culture. So far, it has certainly been an experience well worth it.
In some ways I feel like I can call Budapest home. I have a daily routine which I do, and I am able to get everything I need. I feel like I know my way around the city, and I certainly feel comfortable riding public transportation (Budapest public transportation includes buses, metro, trams, troli buses and a couple commuter trains). It's a nice place, and I've been many great people here.

Classes, Szeged and the Opera

2009-09-26T12:36:00.000-07:00

Well, its been two weeks since my last update! A lot has happened in these past two weeks. I'll try to at least summarize what I have been up lately.

Last weekend we went to the town of Szeged. Szeged is a town in southern Hungary. The trip was organized by the BSM program, so they bought train tickets and reserved a hostel for us. The intention of the trip was to attend a math seminar at the University of Szeged.
As soon as we got off the train in Szeged we were met by a couple university students who led us to where the seminar was to take place. After the seminar they showed us to our hostel and got us checked in. Then it was up to us to explore. Szeged turned out to be a fairly small town with not too much in it. It did have a really cool cathedral with a clock that chimed every 15 minutes. There was also a really cool fountain in part of the city, as well as some cool looking building buildings and a nice city park. Since the city was not that big we ended up walking through the entire city that Friday night after the seminar.
Then the next morning we walked through the town again and got to see everything in daylight. We also got to walk into the cathedral. Then after lunch we walked down to the River Tisza which runs through the city. We went across the bridge and walked along the river side for a while. There was a trail through the woods that we walked on. Once we decided to turn around we found a path going away from the river that led out of the woods. It turns out the the area was only wooded on a small strip near the river. As soon as we left the woods we were able to looks around and see farmland and hills off in the distance. We could even make out building of what appeared to be a nearby town. It really felt like we were in the middle of nowhere. It was quite an amazing feeling. After that we hiked back, had dinner and took an evening train back to Budapest. It was very nice to see a part of Hungary that isn't the big bustling city of Budapest.

This last week was the final week for us to try out classes. This Thursday we had officially register for classes. This wasn't an easy choice because are so many really cool classes that I want to take, but I don't want to have too hard of a schedule that I can't handle. I finally settled on taking 3 math classes and auditing a fourth, as well as taking a Hungarian Language class. The math classes I will be taking this semester are: Intro to Number Theory, Complex Functions and Galois Theory, and auditing a course on Advanced Abstract Algebra. I'm pretty excited about these classes, it looks like I will learn a lot of really cool math these semester.

The other big event that has happened in the two weeks is that this past Wednesday night I went to go see the opera. We were able to get $2 student tickets, which was an amazing deal. It was really cool to see an opera in the Hungarian National Opera House here in Budapest. It was quite an elegant opera house. We saw The Marriage of Figaro which was really cool. It was a bit hard to follow everything that was going on. I couldn't really understand much of either the Italian songs or the Hungarian subtitles that appeared on a screen above the stage. It also didn't help that I could only see about half of the stage. Even so we got to see and hear a world class opera, which was quite a spectacular event.

First Week of Classes

2009-09-12T04:19:00.000-07:00

This week was the first week of classes for me. The week began at 8:15am on Monday morning with an orientation meeting about classes. Then at 10:00 classes began. The way the classes are set up is rather different than what I'm used to. The schedule is set up so that each math class that is supposed to meet 4 hours a week has two two hour meetings during the week. All the non math classes meet three hours once a week. The other different thing is how we choose the classes we take. The first three weeks of the semester we can sit in on as many classes as we want, and only after the third week do we actually have to register for what classes to take. Since I am a very indecisive person this helps me not have to choose what classes I need to take for another couple of weeks.

All the classes were really interesting. There is such a wide variety of math classes I can take here, which is very exciting. Most of the classes here are classes that I wouldn't be able to take at Calvin, which presents me with a very cool opportunity. The only problem with that is that I want to take all the classes. Since this is specifically a math program most of the students here are extremely good math students, some of the top math students in the country. That means the classes here are quite difficult. There some intro classes that aren't as hard, but its still much more intense than I could imagine any math classes at Calvin. Sitting in these classes is a bit intimidating because I do not feel like one of the top students in the country, and thus I would consider myself to be one of the slower students here. It is still an exciting thought that I'm here. Since I will be taking these really challenging math classes, it means that I will learn an amazing amount of material. Though since the classes are so challenging, it means that I probably should limit how many classes I take. This will likely be academically my hardest semester of college.

This week I sat in on 7 different classes for 27 hours this week. Additionally one other class I want to take was canceled for this week. It's going to be a hard choice trying to choose what classes to take, right now I want to take them all!

Other highlights of the week included visiting the Renyi Institute of Mathematics here in Budapest on Thursday afternoon to watch a movie. The Movie was about Paul Erdős, probably the most famous Hungarian Mathematician ever. In his career he authored almost 1500 mathematics papers. It was very interesting to watch the movie that told the personal story of this Hungarian Mathematics legend.

This last Wednesday Greg and I went to eat dinner at a Chinese restaurant near our house. It was a really good place, and very local. A place where no tourist would go. No one at the restaurant spoke English. While eating Greg and I were talking to eachother when a random man asked us in perfect English where we learned to speak English so well. It turns out that he was actually from Chicago and has two houses, once in Budapest and one in Chicago. That was a very interesting encounter.

Free time

2009-09-06T13:26:00.000-07:00

Tuesday was the last day of Language class. As soon as the language class was finished I headed to the college to meet people to take a cruise on the Danube River. Everyone who will be taking classes in the building we will be in was there. I guess there is an international college that uses the same building for classes. The cruise was really cool, we got to see most of the riverfront on the entire city. Budapest truly is a beautiful city. We passed by the really cool looking parliament building a couple times, went under the chain bridge, passed by the Buda Castle and everything else that is visible from the river. That was certainly quite an experience.

Tuesday was also Greg's first day in Budapest. It was good to see him again. Now I have a roommate and do not have to live alone. I really enjoy that. There is someone else in this house that I can communicate with.

On Wednesday we went to the immigration office to apply for residency permits. It was a lot less stressful than I thought it would be, but it did still take a considerable amount of time. The process went pretty smoothly for me without any problems which was good. The really interesting thing was that while we were over there I met the students from the Calvin Hungary semester. They were doing the exact same thing we were doing. It was fun meeting up with other Calvin students. After the immigration office we went out to eat lunch at a Chinese restaurant in Budapest. We found a nice small local place where no one spoke any English. They had pretty good for pretty cheap prices. The other interesting thing about the place was that after we ordered our food they served the food out on a plate and then put it in a microwave to heat it up! An interesting experience. The rest of the day was filled with wandering through the city.

On Thursday Greg and I went up to the Castle District in Budapest. We got some sweet views of the city and got to see some really old buildings. It was a really interesting place to walk around.

Friday we went to St. Stephen's Basilica. That was quite the building I must say. The ceilings were enormously tall, and there was a lot of stain glass windows and other very fancy decorations. We also got to go to a room in the back and saw a box that actually contained St. Steven's right hand. I didn't get a good enough view to be able to say I saw much. Then that afternoon we went to Hero's square and then walked all around a large and beautiful city park in the area. Then that evening we went back to St. Stephen's Basilica for a professional organ concert. It was a beautiful concert. The spectacular venue combined with the amazing skill that the organist had made it quite an unforgettable concert.

Then on Saturday we went to the National Museum and learned a lot about Hungary's history and saw many artifacts. After that we found a festival on the south side of town and stopped by there for a little while. That was also a very interesting cultural experience.

Sick in Budapest

2009-08-31T14:21:00.000-07:00

I can't believe its already been another week. It really doesn't feel like I've been in Hungary 17 days already!! I still feel very much a foreigner to Budapest. I do feel like I know my way around riding the metro just fine. I counted 9 metro stops that I have to pass through on the way to language class. Riding the metro that much has made me feel experienced towards the metro in that respect.

Now I have just one more day of language class left. I don't feel like know very much Hungarian, and I'm able to correctly pronounce even less than that. Even so there are certain conversations that I could have in Hungarian, though given the pace that local speakers speak the language I'd probably still be confused even I was hearing the words I was expecting to hear. The class was mostly focused on speaking the language and certainly has taught me quite a bit. Even so, sitting in class 7 hours a day wasn't the most enjoyable thing and it will be nice to be done. I'm pretty excited for next week when the semester begins and I will be taking math classes. That was the main focus about why I came here.

Last week I missed language school on Thursday and Friday because I had the flu. That was a rather unpleasant experience. I was basically restricted to lying in bed from Wednesday night until Sunday, and I wasn't able to eat a full meal during that time. It was a bit scary getting sick and being alone in a foreign country where I can't speak the language. I was able to communicate to my host family that I was sick, but I was never really able to tell them much about what was really wrong with me. The host family was very good about this, I am very glad I am staying with a host family. They gave me just the right food to eat (dry cereal, crackers and tea) and even called a doctor in to see me on Friday. Seeing the Hungarian doctor was an interesting experience. She knew a few English words, but not enough for me to explain to her what was going on, and I was unable to understand what she was telling me I needed to do. I was given some pills that I need to take, I understood that much, but that's about it. Something must have worked though because by Sunday evening I felt all better and I was able to go to language school on Monday. Overall being sick was not a very fun experience, but things could have been a lot so it really wasn't too bad. I feel quite blessed that things were able to work out the way they did.

Language School and St. Stevens Day

2009-08-21T11:38:00.000-07:00

Well, I've been in Hungary for a full week now!! Just the thought of that seems absolutely crazy. I feel like I just arrived, I do not feel like I know my way around, I do not feel like I have been gone for very long. Even so, the calender tells me it has been a week, so it must be!

So much has happened since my last post.
On Sunday I was able to find an English speaking church I could attend. Buying a metro ticket and riding the metro into the city and locating the church was in interesting experience. Thankfully it wasn't terribly hard to find. It was so good to hear people speaking English! I was able to talk to and understand people for the first time in two days!! It was very different from what I expected, I counted a total of 16 people in church. It was still a great time meeting everyone and studying the Bible together. One of the things I knew I would miss the most while in Hungary is good Christian fellowship with other believers. I think I found a great place where I can go and experience exactly that!! That was very exciting.

On Monday Language School began. All week I have been sitting in class the entire day attempting to learn Hungarian. It isn't a very enjoyable experience. It is cool to be able to read certain signs, and pick out certain words in other people's conversations that I understand. I have even been able to order a couple meals in Hungarian, which has been really cool. I still cannot have anything close to a conversation so communication with my host family has still been minimal.

It is an interesting experience riding the metro everyday to school. It is kind of fun, it feels like more of an adventure. I know its really normal in any city that has a metro, but that's not a situation I've ever been in before.

Yesterday was August 20. and in Hungary they celebrate St. Steven's day. Steven was the first king of Hungary that united the people and brought Christianity to the county. There were many celebrations. I ended up sleeping in, so I missed some events that happened in the morning. I was still able to make it to a few events.

The first event I made it to was an air race down the Danube River. Basically they had 17 pilots all fly a particular course down the river that was marked by gates. The pilots had to fly their plane through each of the gates marked out, and depending on the color they had to be either level or flying sideways when passing through. It was a really crazy even, but really cool! The course began and ended with the pilots flying under the famous chain bridge, also a really crazy thing to see!!

After that I went to the Parliament building and there was a King Steven reenactment going on. That was really interesting to see. I couldn't really follow too well since all the dialog was in Hungarian. It was still a really cool thing to witness.

Then in the evening I went to the fireworks show on the Danube River. It was the best fireworks show I have ever seen. There were fireworks going off from everywhere along the river all at once. I had to fight many crowds to get a decent view, but it was completely worth it!

Overall St. Stevens day was amazing. Budapest certainly knows how to celebrate the day of their first King!

First day

2009-08-16T06:41:00.000-07:00

Well, I made it to Budapest. The over went fairly smoothly, the only problem being that my flight out of Chicago was delayed three hours. We had to sit in the plane at the gate for three hours which was very frustrating. By the time we actually took off I knew I had missed by next flight into Budapest. Things went alright with that though. The airline put me on the next flight to Budapest, which meant I only had to wait a couple of hours. Also it was fairly easy to call Budapest and tell them that I would be arriving later.

As soon as I got to Budapest I was able to find a person holding a sign that said BSM. I knew that must be for me. It turned out that it was the lady in charge of the semester program over here in Budapest. That was good. She got a taxi for me and took me to meet my host family.

My host family is really nice. They are an older couple, I would guess that they are retired. The living arrangements here are really nice too. I have my own bedroom, and we have a living room and kitchen and bathroom to ourselves. I have enough space that I can have my own privacy, but still I have had quite a bit of contact with my host family. The only issue I have had is that my host family does not know any English! It has been interesting trying to communicate with them. Its been fun though, and they are really nice!

As soon as I got in during the late afternoon, I was served a dinner that consisted of bread and soup with meatballs. It was good to get a nice meal to eat. Then I didn't do very much for the rest of the evening, and went to bed early since I was still quite tired from the journey over here.

I ended up sleeping in until 11am the next morning. I was served some French Toast for breakfast, which was very good. Then I decided to go for a walk and see the surrounding area. I found a main road fairly close to the house and chose one way and decided to walk that way. As I walked along this road I began to realize that this road was right next to the river. That made me excited that I might soon come to the main part of the city. I hoped I was walking in the right direction along the river. I ended up coming to a bridge, and I decided to cross the bridge. On the other side of the river I could see a big hill, and many houses, exactly like the pictures of Budapest that I had seen. Crossing the river took much longer than I expected. There was an island in middle of the river that initially made the crossing appear shorter than what it was. It took me at least 15 minutes to walk across the river to the other side. I walked around for a little bit and decided to head back. I wanted to make it back by 4:30pm because that was when I thought that dinner was going to be served.

After dinner my host family took me to the nearest bus stop and metro stop, and we took the metro to the Babilon Language school where I will be taking classes on Monday. It was interesting how they were able to show me around and tell me where everything was even though I didn't understand a single word they were saying. They bought me an ice cream cone on the way back, which was also really nice!

I went to bed that night having not heard a single word of English all day. It was certainly a new experience. It does make me feel a little lonely right now, but that's okay, I'm sure once I meet other students in the semester I will be able to make friends with them. That will happen on Monday when the language school begins.

Overall Budapest seems like a very interesting place. I have yet to make it to any of the tourist parts of town, so I haven't seen any of the really old buildings or things that the city is famous for. Even so, it has been a great cultural experience so far. I've found the idea of trying to figure out everything in a foreign city kind of exciting (scary also). I did not bring my camera with me on either of my trips out, so I don't have any pictures yet. I'll take pictures later and post them up. Don't worry, they'll be here.